Lovely Layers

Went down to Olympia with some friends today, to take a class at the Art & Soul Stamp Store called "Lovely Layers". The teacher had made gorgeous papers and taught us her technique. First she taught us about color theory and other art stuff like values, intensity, saturation, positive/negative space, etc. It might sink in for me at some time. LOL I had lots of fun playing with the stamps, inks & embossing powders that were provided. Here are the four sheets (8-1/2" 11") I made in class, it will be fun to cut them up and us them in projects. And look forward to making more at home.

Blue ATCs 2

These are the other 5 ATC's for the ccswap described in the post below. When I was making the blue version of the Black Pearl Paper, I had extra mixed turquoise with metallic pearl white acrylic paints. Instead of throwing it away, I sponged it on my new favorite stamp, and stamped it onto blue foil paper (wash acrylic paints off of stamps right away). I stamped a script stamp onto blue vellum with Distress ink and heat set the ink.

Here's a close up of the finished ATC:

Even though I used the same blues in these ATCs, it has a totally different look from the first set.

Blue ATCs 1

These are for a ccswaps 10:9 ATC swap, the theme is blue/purple/turquoise, using some or all of those colors. I had these in mind when I made the blue version of the Black Pearl Paper Backgrounds. I adhered the background to card stock, then cut it into ATC sized pieces and used a silver leafing pen to do the edging. I used some of the Luminous Paste Background Paper to cut out and emboss the large hearts. I ran a Distress ink pad over the top to make the embossing stand out.

I used the left over text paper from this project to punch out the butterflies. Here's a close up of the finished ATC:I love all the texture on this ATC, it doesn't come through in a photo.

Swirls & Birds Deco

Another NGS deco book (all three books came in the mail yesterday: almost as good as Christmas!) I had lots of black acrylic paint on my sponge while making the Black Pearl Paper Backgrounds yesterday, so I sponged it onto this swirly stamp and covered some paper. (Remember to wash acrylic paints of your stamps right away.)
Felt like bright & shimmery colors, so I ran some Twinkling H2Os over the paper.
This deco owner likes birds. I had a large chipboard bird, colored it with Distress ink, ran it through a Cuttlebug embossing folder and then highlighted the raised area with a Brilliance ink pad.
Here is the finished front:
And the back:

Black Pearl Paper Backgrounds & Deco

This is the tenth background in Trish's Background Noise Challenges. Check on the link to her blog for complete instruction.

I made two sheets, one with black acrylic paint and another one with dark blue acrylic paint.
I didn't have any pearlescent colors of acrylic paint, so I mixed turquoise with metallic pearl white and sponged that on both sheets, after wrinkling then straightening them out. Then a sponged on metallic gold acrylic to the black sheet and metallic silver acrylic on the blue sheet.
Trish is right, it's hard to show the glimmer of these in a photo, plus the texture is so cool, very thick. Here's a close up of the black sheet:

And a close up of the blue sheet:
I decided to cut up the black sheet for one of the Next-Generation-Stampers' deco book. Front of page:
Back of page:

Deco for Denise Rand

Denise is another Art-Venturer participating in the "Art" deco swap. Denise requested we make pages with people and animals combined. I started with a piece of paper that had picked up extra spray from other projects and ran a brush of watered down Distress ink over the entire surface.

I ran it through the diamond Cuttlebug embossing folder and ran Brilliance ink over the raised areas to tone the color down a bit.

Added images & embellishments, including the word "art". Here is the front:

Here is the back:

I hope this is what Denise had in mind. LOL

Fabric ATC

This is for a swap on ccswaps. No paper allowed.

Envelope Please Swap

This is for a swap called Envelope Please on ccswaps. The directions are to create an envelope as beautiful as what is inside. What we send and how we decorate are all up to us.
I have some blank open envelopes just waiting to be used. I like the buff color of the envelope, so I embossed the numbers Cuttlebug embossing folder and inked the raised areas with a VersaMark pad and heat set.

I re-embossed the envelope in a different embossing folder and inked with a Distress pad.

I did another re-embossing with the diamond embossing folder and inked with a darker Distress pad. I did the same with buff colored paper to cover the booklet I made.
To add a decorative accent, and to hide the areas that show the edge of the embossing folder, I inked paper with Distress ink, ran it through the diamond embossing folder and re-inked with the same Distress ink.
I covered the messy areas on the booklet and envelope with the accent piece, added some large old brads and flattened them with Tim Holtz's Distress Hammer.
Here is the front of the finished booklet:

For the insides of the covers, I found scraps of paper with raised dots that reminded me of mini brads. I embossed them with the diamond embossing folder and inked the raised areas with Distress ink.
Here's the finished inside of the booklet. It can hold inchies, small embellishments or.......
I inked up a bland address label and added it to the envelope ready to be addressed. To protect the envelope, I will mail it in a clear plastic envelope.

Tag Deco

One of the Next-Generation-Stampers, sent out a deco book made of tags. What a fun idea!

I started out with some paper I had sprayed with home made color mist sprays and then watered down. I cut out a piece to match the tag in the book.

I highlighted the edges with Distress ink and stamped a saying in the middle of the tag with Archival ink,which will be semi-concealed with an image.I did the packing tape transfer of a magazine image to add to the tag. Stamped the word "play" around the edges in brick red & black soot Distress inks, added metal letters to spell "play" and a dragonfly charm, darkened the edges with black soot Distress ink and added fun fibers, I got with Adrienne when we met up art Art & Soul last October.

Post Card Deco page for Maggie

Maggie is another Art-Venturer participating in the "art" deco round robin. She sent out watercolor postcards, wanting us to put our name, city, state, country in the address blanks. What a great idea, love it. Decided I wanted to make it a personal letter to my friend Maggie.

I started by stamping a flourish stamp with silver acrylic paint on both sides. (Make sure to always wash acrylics off your stamps right away.)

Next, I watered down a light Distress ink and brayered it on both sides and used a heat gun to speed the drying.

I did the same with a darker Distress ink, but sprayed a lot of water on it to lighten it up.

I stamped an image, and added an "A" sticker over some tissue paper I'd colored some time ago.

I find tissue paper easier to cut and adhere, if it's run through the xyron before trimming the image down. Then I remove the xyron backing from one edge, and slowly pull back the backing, while sticking the image down. This helps to prevent tearing.

I stamped a saying with the same Brilliance ink I used on the image and edging of the card.

I wanted the back to look worn, used and sent. Added an image of a French stamp, stamped multiple French postal cancellation images with Brilliance Lightening Black ink and heat set it. Then I stamped several sayings with Black Archival Ink.

Hope Maggi enjoys this as much as I did making it.

Margaret's Deco page

Margaret is one of the Art-Venturers participating in a deco swap where the word Art must appear somewhere on the page. Margaret mentioned she liked what I've been doing with the Cuttlebug embossing folder, so I used one on the page for her deco. I used Brilliance ink to highlight the raised areas on the front of the page,

and on the back of the page. I placed the area of overlap of embossing on the page where I plan to add other elements.
For the contrast on the page, I sprayed Shimmering Mist over both sides and dried with a heat gun.

I thought it was fun to obviously change the word "attitude" to "artitude" for this piece. I used the same stickers as the words "play" & "create". I wove this multicolored ribbon through the page.

Here's the back. I ran a piece of gold paper through the same Cuttlebug embossing folder to create a contrasting stripe. I used a piece of the red Textured Gesso backgrounds I made in March to use behind the large A and to punch out the butterflies. I edged the butterflies with a gold leafing pen. I brought the ribbon ends from the front around to the back and threaded them through a large gold colored bead.

It doesn't show up in these photos, but the pages have a delicious shimmer to them.